


Blood and Water

by The_Pied_Avocet



Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: BBK Week, Black Butler Kids Week, But shhh, Fluff, Mostly happy times, OCiel, Phantomhive Twins - Freeform, RCiel, the end gets angsty again
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-10
Updated: 2018-08-10
Packaged: 2019-06-25 07:42:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,258
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15636273
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Pied_Avocet/pseuds/The_Pied_Avocet
Summary: When Tanaka may lose his job over something Ciel did, Astre must decide if telling the truth is the same thing as betraying his brother.





	Blood and Water

**Author's Note:**

> I'm honestly not sure why I changed perspectives so much over the course of this drabble. It's not very professional of me, but because I had fun, I've decided it's okay.

“Thousands and thousands of years ago,” Ciel began theatrically, kneeling up on his bed, “before man was civil and his brain was the size of a walnut… he looked up at the sun every day, and he thought about fire. And how much he wanted fire for himself. He could use it in the dark to see, and in the cold to warm himself by. He could use it to scare away predators, and cook food to make it taste better.”

In the dimness of their bedroom, Ciel’s words alone made Astre shiver, as if he himself were a Neolithic man hiding scared in his cave. He tugged his pillowy white comforter around his shoulders, but his gaze didn’t, and couldn’t, leave his brother as the history of humankind unfolded before him.

“Then one day…” Ciel threw his arms up in the air and spread his fingers wide. “Man dropped a piece of flint onto a rock, and it made a spark, and the spark ex _plo_ ded into fire when it touched a tree! And ever since that day, fire has made man the most powerful animal in the world.”

Ciel hopped over the gap between his bed and Astre’s, landing before him. He wrapped the other end of the comforter around his own shoulders and held his face inches away from his twin’s. “And like man turned the wolf into the spaniel, so too has he made fire small and tame for him. Until one day…” Ciel’s hands disappeared into his robe pocket and emerged cupped around something, and he opened them like a clam shows off a magnificent pearl. “… he had made fire fit into a pretty metal box, and come to him every time he called.”

Clasped in that small palm was a golden rectangle with rounded corners, fittingly the size of a matchbox. It was a lighter. Its surface was etched with olive branches and a plump crown and the phrase “GOTT MIT UNS.” Its visibility was just slight in the waning summer sun that whispered through the bedroom’s sheer white curtains. But when Ciel tipped open the top of the lighter and clicked a little button with his thumb, out came fire, and everything but the halo around the boys’ faces was bathed in darkness.

Just as Astre was becoming mesmerized by the flame’s blue heart, Ciel snuffed it out. Astre had to blink to readjust his eyes to the darkness, until he was able to see his brother grinning proudly. “Isn’t it something?” Ciel said. “Isn’t it just wonderfully grown-up?”

“It is,” Astre agreed. “It is wonderfully grown-up. Was it a gift from Father?”

Ciel’s proud smile became a bit more mischievous and a bit more guilty. He dipped his shoulders in a shrug. “No. I found it.”

“Found it? Where?”

“In the billiards room.”

Astre’s eyes lit up like the heart of the flame. “We aren’t allowed in there.”

Now Ciel looked perplexed. “Yes, we are.”

“Grampa says that room is full of temptations not fit for boys our age.”

“That doesn’t mean we aren’t allowed in there,” Ciel argued. “Father and Mother never said we couldn’t go in, and they’re the only ones who can really tell us what to do. I mean, we call Tanaka ‘Grampa,’ but he’s still part of the staff, same as the others.”

Astre chewed his lip. It was true, but it still felt odd for Ciel to talk about Mr. Tanaka like that.

“… Anyway,” Ciel said more cheerily, desperate to win his audience back, “Father had Mr. Diedrich come by this morning, and they stayed in the billiards room until two o’clock. When I went in hours later, it still stunk of tobacco. You know, the really strong kind. The one with the triangle on the box.” He wrinkled his nose up in memory. “But even after all that smoking, Diedrich left this pretty treasure behind. And now it has a home with me! And I won’t use it on anything so awful as those smelly cigars.”

“Wow,” said Astre, enraptured with his brother’s poetry and wanting more of it. “What will _you_ use it for?”

“Hmm.” Ciel opened the lighter again, clicking at the button to make the flame spring out. “Lanterns, I think, in the wintertime. To guide the sleigh for the ponies through the snow. And… Mother’s favorite candles that smell like lavender and springtime. Oh, and we can hold it beneath mugs of butter and chocolate, and they’ll melt together into the most scrummy treat!”

“Ah!” Astre gave a sudden shout of surprise. “You burnt the edge of the comforter!”

“Oh, blast,” Ciel cursed. He put the flame away. “Don’t cry,” he soothed, when he saw Astre tearing up. “You can have my comforter. I won’t let you get in trouble.”

Astre sniffled. “Aren’t _you_ going to get in trouble?”

Ciel shook his head, springing back over to his own mattress and tugging the comforter off the top of it. “No. If anyone asks, I’ll just tell them that a candle did it.”

“But what if Mr. Diedrich comes back looking for his lighter?”

“… I guess I would give it to him,” Ciel answered, though he sounded reluctant. “But I would tell him he needs to be more careful with his things.”

Astre giggled into his hands. “Mr. Diedrich would be very angry if you said that!”

“He’d be angry because I’d be right!” Ciel laughed. He slung the comforter around his shoulders like it was the cape of a king. “Now, will you help me switch over the blankets? They’re heavy.”

* * *

“Pardon me, sir. We have just received an urgent letter from Baron Diedrich in the post.”

Tanaka announced this at breakfast the very next morning, holding out a silver tray with the envelope sitting on it alone. Ciel and Astre froze in the middle of eating their poached eggs and back bacon. They stared at the item on the tray like it was a two-headed goat.

“Oh? I wonder what this could be,” Vincent said simply, pinching the paper between gloved fingers and plying open the wax seal with his butter knife. “Diedrich was here for hours yesterday. Can’t imagine what he would’ve forgotten to mention.”

“I do hope nothing serious has come up,” Mr. Tanaka offered.

Astre was staring at his father with rapt attention. Ciel had to kick him under the table to remind him to keep eating. But the breakfast no longer tasted much like anything to Astre, and his stomach had started to hurt.

Vincent read the letter for what felt like an eternity. He slipped it into his inner jacket pocket when he was finished reading. “It would seem Diedrich is missing something and wants to know if it was left here by mistake. Do you know who tidied the billiards room after our little tête-à-tête yesterday?”

Tanaka bent a bit at the waist. “I did so myself, sir. I know how you prefer the billiards table to be brushed from the pockets to the center after a game. It takes a trusted hand to keep from ruining the baize.”

“Indeed, it does,” Vincent said. “Did you happen to notice a lighter anywhere in the room while you were straightening it up?”

Astre’s mouth immediately went sour.

Tanaka’s bushy white eyebrows drew together. “No, sir, I did not.”

“I know Deidrich had it with him yesterday. We used it on our cigars,” Vincent said. “He told me he’s looked everywhere in the London house and his carriage… It was a gift, and it is very important to him. I think it might even be made of gold.”

“Made of gold?” Rachel put a hand to her mouth. “Oh my. That sounds like a very nice lighter. A very, very nice lighter.”

“Yes,” Vincent agreed. “Then it’s no wonder he wants it back so badly… before someone else finds it.” His gaze traveled steadily over to Tanaka as he said this.

“I will go back to the billiards room and look around diligently right now,” Tanaka promised, with a hand to his heart.

Vincent stood up then, pushing in his chair. “No… I think I had better be the one to do that… But somehow I get the feeling I won’t find anything.”

“Sir? You don’t mean…?” Tanaka couldn’t finish the sentence.

“It takes a trusted hand to clean a billiards table properly,” Vincent said. “But can that same hand be trusted with temptation?”

Tanaka’s mouth was open. “Master Phantomhive. I would never.”

“Well then, come along with me,” Vincent motioned to him briskly, “and hopefully we will locate this thing that you would _never_ take.”

Tanaka paused under the scrutiny of the man he had served since boyhood. For a moment, the injury in his face was deep enough to age him five years. Then he gave his head a shake, remembering himself, and followed obediently at Vincent’s heels as they departed for the downstairs.

“Oh, dear,” Rachel sighed. “What a troubling way to start the morning… Astre! Are you crying?”

Silent tears had, in fact, started falling down the younger son’s face. Astre couldn’t find the strength to smudge them away.

“He spilled too much salt on his eggs, and it’s too spicy for him,” Ciel interjected. “I saw him spill it.” He jumped to his feet. “Come, Astre, let’s go see if Cook has any milk for you.”

Ciel dragged his brother away from the table by his arm in the direction of the kitchen. Instead of approaching Cook, though, Ciel took him out the other door into the hallway.

“Shhh, stop it,” Ciel said, wiping at Astre’s face with his own sleeves, as gently as a nine-year-old boy could manage, which was rather not gentle.

“G-Grampa’s in t-trouble,” Astre sobbed. “F-Father is really m-mad at him.”

“Don’t cry though!” Ciel couldn’t help but demand it. “If you cry, Mother will know something’s up!”

“Father thinks Grampa took the lighter!” Ciel sniveled. “What if Father makes him leave?” The thought had Astre crying even harder.

“Stop it. Father would never do that.” Ciel didn’t look fully convinced though. “He would never,” he said more strongly, rubbing Astre’s shaking shoulders. “It’s going to be okay. I’ll put the lighter back in the billiards room this afternoon, as if it just got overlooked. And then he’ll realize Mr. Tanaka never did it, and everything will be fine.”

“O-Okay.” Crisis averted, Astre was able to stop his tears then.

Ciel was true to his word. He snuck down to the billiards room before lunch, after the brothers’ early lessons, and left it on the cushion of the armchair Diedrich favored. Ciel dashed up into the nursery after it was done, slipping into his chair and winking at Astre to let him know all was taken care of. A minute later, their lunch was brought to their little windowside table – and not by Tanaka, but another butler.

“Maddox? What are you doing here?” Ciel said with a carefulness. “Where is Tanaka?”

Maddox, a comparatively new hire, shook his head. “I wish I could tell you, little sir, but the truth is, I don’t know. Mr. Tanaka hasn’t been around this whole morning,” he answered. “I hope he hasn’t taken ill… In any case, your father asked me to serve you lunch instead, young masters. Today we’re having steak and kidney pudding, and some cauliflower cheese.”

Ciel paused, then nodded. “Very good, Maddox. That’ll be all.” Maddox left at the shooing motion he was given, which he succeeded in not laughing at. “Don’t cry,” Ciel said softly to his brother, who was already crying. “I just put the lighter back. Father will see it soon.”

“What if Grampa is already gone? What if he’s packing his bags right now?” Astre couldn’t imagine not saying goodbye. He couldn’t imagine saying goodbye either.

“Even if he is,” Ciel said, “once Father finds the lighter, he’ll know he made a mistake and call Tanaka straight back. Astre,” Ciel reached for his hand, “I promise it’s gonna be okay. We just have to let it alone.”

But Astre couldn’t let it alone. It had been on his mind all day. The idea of someone leaving his life so abruptly, knowing he would never see them again … the idea was far too much to bare.

* * *

Astre had only been in the servants’ quarters twice. The first time was just to see what it looked like, to know each inch of his own home, as a child is wont to do. The second was to bring Tanaka breakfast when he was sick one morning last year. He and Ciel had insisted on delivering it. Because Mr. Tanaka was like family to them, and family deserved to know they were cared for. Surely Ciel hadn’t forgotten that? Surely Father hadn’t?

Tanaka, being the senior butler of the manor, had a bedroom all to himself at the end of the narrow hall. As Astre hesitated before the door, he had to wonder at it. It was different than the other doors in the manor – all the doors in the servants’ quarters were. The knob didn’t glisten so brightly, and the wood didn’t shine with polish. The Phantomhive manor was only as brilliant as its dustiest corner; Mr. Tanaka had said so himself. Why should any part of it not glow? Even if it did belong to the servants?

Astre shook his head. There was no time for that puzzlement now. He brought his small fist to the wood and knocked.

“One moment. I’m coming.” Tanaka’s voice called from inside. Seconds later, he opened it, and his eyebrows jumped to his hairline at the sight of the boy. “Oh! Young master!” He crouched down to one knee before him. “I’m sorry, my old eyes aren’t so perfect… Which of the boys have I got before me?”

“Astre,” Astre said. He sniffled. “Grampa, I know you didn’t take Mr. Diedrich’s lighter.”

Tanaka hesitated, then clapped his hand to the child’s shoulder. “Oh, my boy… Have you been worrying about me? Is that why you’re here?”

“I… I know you didn’t take it.” Astre tugged at his own sleeve. “It’s… um… I bet… I bet it just didn’t get seen… I bet it’s still in the billiards room and maybe someone smaller needs to find it. If I looked… I might see it.”

“… Hmm.” Mr. Tanaka stood, tucking his arms behind his back. “You might,” he said finally. “But you know… your father wouldn’t like it if I went with you. He's angry at me right now. I think you should tell him the idea yourself.”

Astre felt his body stiffen. He suddenly realized he was afraid to do that. He loved his father very much, but he had rarely spent any time alone with him. After all, his father was very busy and very important, and even met with the Queen on a regular basis. Sometimes Astre couldn’t believe he was Vincent Phantomhive’s son. The older he got, the more he learned about his sire, and the more he realized he had to live up to. Even eating breakfast across from each other could be intimidating. Vincent Phantomhive seemed to exude prestige.

But he needed to do this for Grampa. He had to be brave.

“Okay. I’ll tell him,” Astre nodded, and dashed off so quickly to take care of things that he didn’t see the approving look Tanaka followed him with.

* * *

Vincent glanced up from his desk covered in tax notices for his shire and agricultural reports and other papers of varying importance. The sound of tiny knuckles on wood had caught his attention. Vincent leaned back in his chair, smiled knowingly, briefly, and then called, “Come in.”

The study door was well-oiled, but it couldn’t help but creak with the slowness at which it was opened. At the big blue eyes peeking around the wood, Vincent knew immediately which son came to him. His twins were identical in looks only – their mannerisms made them as different as apples and peaches. “Astre,” he said, and put a knuckle to his chin, smiling again. Well, wasn’t this a surprise. “What’s brought you into my office this afternoon, hm?”

Astre was nervous. Vincent could see it at once in the way he toed carefully across the Isfahan rug like a little fawn. Shaking like a little fawn, too. And if Astre had turned and ran as the hart from the hunter, Vincent would have called him back gently. But he would not sully his son’s courage while it held fast. He would be the imposing Earl of Phantomhive, not a father, as long as it gave his children the power to be strong.

“What is it, then?” Vincent asked, with just a hint of softness.

Astre couldn’t remove his gaze from the floor, but he conjured up his voice regardless. “Grampa… I mean, Mr. Tanaka. He didn’t steal Mr. Diedrich’s lighter. I know he didn’t. He would never do that. You know that too, right?”

Vincent tilted his head. “Do I?”

Astre pondered that for a moment. “I know it.”

Vincent stood up from his chair then. He was tall, which could be especially foreboding to children. Astre froze but didn’t bolt as Vincent rounded his desk and leaned himself against the front of it, folded his arms. “And how do you know it?” he asked.

“Um…” Astre tugged at his jacket hem, a nervous action he executed regularly. It was a little navy blue jacket, with all but one of the gold buttons undone to show off the white shirt beneath, and his sleeves were cuffed around his small wrists. Vincent could scarcely remember being that small. “I think I could find the lighter, if we went to the billiards room. Because I’m closer to the ground. I might see it in a place you might not.”

“But you said you _know_ Tanaka didn’t take it,” Vincent reminded. “How do you _know_?”

“Because Mr. Tanaka is…” Astre dithered off. “He would… never…”

Vincent was notorious in his circle for putting people on the spot. For the first time in his life, he felt mild discomfort during an interrogation. But he had to know how his boy would handle it. “That is not knowledge, Astre. That is an assumption.” Vincent strode over to the window, looked out at his lands. “There isn’t anyone in the world,” he said, “that you should believe you can trust in full.”

Astre didn’t say anything. Vincent almost wondered if he’d scared him off at last, but when he turned back a minute later, Astre was still there.

“Yes there is,” the boy finally answered. “It’s Mr. Tanaka. It’s your butler. You can trust him.” He began to cry. “It’s your children you can’t trust. We’re the ones who lied. I know where the lighter is. It’s in the billiards room. It’s on one of the armchairs. So please, don’t make Mr. Tanaka go!”

Vincent didn’t give his son a break yet. “We checked the entire room, twice,” he said. “How did the lighter get onto the chair? Surely we would have seen it.”

“Ciel put it there after the fact,” Astre said. “He was hoping you’d see it and then realize Mr. Tanaka didn’t take it.” He was still shaking, with nervousness and sobs. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you right away. But it’s not Grampa’s fault. Please don’t make him leave the manor.”

When it was an adult getting caught in their lie, Vincent would always fix them with that perfectly piercing stare he had, the one that made people feel as if every detail of their lives was already known and ready to be used against them – which was sometimes the case. Then he might have asked the liar, in his darkest voice, “What do you suppose should happen next…?” and waited for the answer that came from fearful lips. He did not enjoy being lied to, but seeing the discomfort in the faces of those that tried and failed to cross him more than made up for it.

Not once had anyone ever admitted they had kept knowledge from Vincent Phantomhive before he’d found out on his own. They would rather wait to be caught. But Astre was only a child, and he’d come in, daring to face the consequences anyway.

A punishment would be a terrible thing to exact now. If he did that, his son may never give him the truth so willingly again, and Vincent thought no more highly of anything than he did honesty.

“Come here, my boy,” Vincent held out his hand. When Astre looked at him uncertainly, he continued, “You aren’t in any trouble.” Just as Vincent could make his gaze dagger-sharp, so too could he melt it like caramel and enamor just about anyone. _Like the sly fox in a fairy tale_ , Astre would think many years later. But for now, all Astre could feel was relief as he joined his father at the windowsill.

“I knew all along Tanaka didn’t steal the lighter,” Vincent said. Astre looked up at him in shock, which made Vincent share half a grin. “I do trust him very much. He and I came up with the ruse together. For instance, this morning, with the letter… Well. See for yourself.” Vincent removed the parchment from his jacket, unfolded it, and handed it to the boy. Astre stared at it. It was blank. “It was a red herring,” the Earl said, patting his youngest’s hair, “a fake. And we made up a seal by stamping the wax with a decorative drawer knob. So yes... I knew the whole time that Ciel had the lighter. The maids saw the burn mark on the duvet. And as I’m always certain to keep my lighters where your young hands can’t reach… For the Queen’s watchdog, it was a mere exercise in sleuthing.”

Astre had stopped crying by now. He was looking up at his father with such shining, awestruck eyes. “So you pretended you thought Mr. Tanaka took the lighter because you wanted me and Ciel to give you the real story?”

“Well,” Vincent chuckled, “I pretended I didn’t know because I wanted _Ciel_ to give me the real story. As he’s the thief. Yes?”

Astre chewed his lip momentarily. “He is,” he said at last. “But you got something wrong, Father, because it was my comforter that was burned. Ciel switched mine with his because he didn’t want me to get in trouble.”

“… Yes. It appears I did get something wrong.” Two times in one day he was surprised. What a good day indeed. “And do you suppose Ciel would have eventually told me the truth?”

Astre was quiet. Then he said, “I think he would have, but maybe it would have been too late, and I… I couldn’t watch Grampa get in trouble.”

“Even if it means Ciel will get in trouble?” At Astre’s worried look, Vincent added, “Yes, he is going to be in trouble.”

“Are you going to cane him?” Astre gasped as if caning were the worst possible fate imaginable.

Vincent couldn’t help laughing. “Cane him? I’ve never caned either of you, why would you… No, no, I’m just going to talk with him, same as I’m talking with you. He needs to know that when he keeps secrets from me, he is showing disrespect. And we can’t have that in this household.”

Astre swung his foot back and jabbed at the carpet with his toe. “I didn’t want him to get in trouble. I really didn’t.”

“I can tell,” Vincent chuckled. Then he bent down so he could see eye to eye with his son. His children had the prettiest eyes, just like their mother. “It’s time you understood… that there are two sorts of families in this world,” Vincent said. “There is the family related to you by blood. Then there is the family you discover. The family you choose. People like Tanaka. You call him grandfather, because he is like that to you. But Ciel is your twin – and I imagine he will find out you betrayed him, and be upset.”

Astre looked like he wanted to cry again.

“There will be times in life when we have to choose between those we love and what we think is right,” Vincent said. He squared his shoulders, at his full height again. “Therefore, it is important that you reflect on why you made your choice. You made it for Tanaka. Because even if you care about your brother most, you had decided what was the right thing to do, and you chose to act on that.” Vincent beamed down at his child. It was a look any woman would swoon at, and even Astre felt it pressing upon him like a finger of light. “I’m proud that you are a young man driven by your morals rather than peer pressure. That will do you well in school… and in life.”

Astre felt very proud in that moment. It was perhaps the proudest he had ever felt, even four years later. He’d had his father’s approval, and Mr. Tanaka’s – but not Ciel’s. Ciel had, in fact, not spoken to his brother for an entire day. So, Astre’s proudest moment was still marred by a sickly guilt at allowing his own brother to take a fall.

It was a feeling the boy had so hated at the time. It was a feeling which was now as familiar to Astre as his own reflection.

**Author's Note:**

> So as far as I can tell, a lighter might not have actually been referred to as a lighter yet. The fusee lighter would be pretty new, and the Magic Pocket Lamp wouldn't have been invented yet (thanks, [this website](http://www.toledo-bend.com/VCL/articles/index.asp?request=lighterHistory)). But if Yana takes liberties, I'll take liberties. It's called a lighter, it was already invented and available to the public, and Diedrich has one because he's a Rich Boy™
> 
> Also, the lighter wasn't made of gold. Vincent just said that knowing in kid terms, gold = expensive, and he wanted Ciel to understand how important it was.


End file.
